Sewanhaka School District to Launch New Website

At the Dec. 19 Board of Education meeting, a presentation was given by the district’s chief information officer, Rich Zwycewicz, on the launch of a new school website.

The current website, which was revised in 2008, was enhanced through SchoolWires to provide an advanced communication among parents, students and administration in the district.

Right now, each school website exists independently on the district website and was created on various platforms with only one webmaster able to add or update content,” Zwycewicz said. “One of the problems with this current configuration is the lack of consistency and co-activity between the district site, the school sites, the various department sites and the individual teacher sites.”

Currently, there is no directory for the teacher sites, which Zwycewicz explained each student or parent must go to the web address for each of their teachers, as compared to having a directory list of teacher sites to choose from.

“Furthermore (because of the advanced technical skills required to maintain the current site), if we need to get a message out quickly, such as an emergency snow-closing, it would require the efforts of six webmasters to make sure the message was posted on the Websites,” Zwycewicz said.

Now, with the launch in January comes a brand-new website that is easier to operate and features color-coded school sites. For example, New Hyde Park Memorial High School is in blue, Sewanhaka High School in purple, Elmont High School in green, H. Frank Carey High School in yellow and the district website in red.  

“Our new website provides for consistent flow and uniformity while allowing each school the ability to remain unique,” Zwycewicz said. “Our school sites have a faculty directory so that parents and students can easily find the teacher sites they are looking for…At the top of all websites is a horizontal menu named the ‘My Start’ bar. ‘District’ will always bring you back to the main district site from wherever you are — school, department or teacher.”

In addition, the new site will have a “Select a School” drop –down menu, “Shortcuts” button (like links to the school’s lunch menu), and “Announcements,” among others.

The district website will be operated and monitored by Zwycewicz and each individual school site falls under the responsibility of the school principal.

“Our goal has been to get as much information from our websites to the new SchoolWires website so that we can go live in January without anyone missing any information that they can access now,” Zwycewicz said. “We are excited about launching this tool as we increase communication among all our constituents.”